My journey begins with that event, emotion, feeling, sentiment, or passion that triggers in me the need for release. Its release into the unknown to be controlled, tamed, and hopefully understood. Consequently, there is a time period in which I can grasp this uncontrolled, chaotic disarray of energy in order to translate it into something understandable. If I attempt this feat too quickly after the trigger my ability to seize and organize is severely inhibited by the extreme chaos of emotions. Therefore, when I am attempting to write I must allow my thoughts to settle and calm to a point where I can then begin to try this control and release. This time period can be anything from a couple hours to a couple months, thus so far has been the case.
When I do begin this process of putting my thoughts on paper, I am usually alone, in my mind at least. People can surround me, but as long as I am able to be in solitude with myself and not distracted by my environment I can write. I almost prefer writing with people around rather that isolating myself alone in my room. This also serves as inspiration at times. I can be completely isolated in my thoughts and experiencing my solitude when surrounded and people watching. Others, even strangers, give large amounts of inspiration when you watch them. From watching interactions between friends or couples, to someone alone and their actions or seeming emotions, these observations become poetry. Not only being inspiring in themselves, these observations can arouse the long settled chaos in the back of my mind. These observations serve as a broom stirring up dust in the corner allowing me to reach for, again or possible the first time, a similar even in my own life.
Following along with my environment, I favor being outside when writing poetry. Whether warm or cool, the touching, tasting, smelling, seeing, and hearing of nature and what is life inspires my words. It also inspires my thoughts and emotions. Although I may not write about the grass or sky every time I write outside, the beauty of creation inspires other, deeper intimacies in life, more specifically, God. I am able to see God in the natural world and experience Him, in ways, including being outside, in His creation. The complex subject matter that is God, faith, and romance, inspires an uncountable number of sense and emotions to grasp with the language of poetry.
A final aspect, of the environment of my journey includes a pen or pencil and paper. I cannot, even dream, of initially writing a poem on a computer, typewriter, or any type of technology. What is most natural and real flows most directly and uninhibited onto paper with a pen or pencil. With a computer, the process of writing becomes processed and unnatural going through various steps to become a product. When I am writing straight onto paper I am able to put everything I am thinking down immediately, and then go back and correct. This makes for a more authentic, personal product, rather than something influence, edited, and auto-formatted. My opinion concerning the use of a pencil or pen for the initial creation of a piece of any creative writing holds strong. It is a better product in the end.
Completing the aspect of the journey concerning where my poems are born, lets continue to the centrality that is poetry writing, the inspiration. Many different things inspire my writing, some topics and subject matters more than others; however I feel my poetry covers a wide range. Among many forms of inspiration are relationships. Any sort of relationship can cause feelings of pain, loss, and struggle, beauty, love, joy which are some of the emotions I express when I do write about relationships with friends, significant others, and God. It is very cathartic to write poetry.
The tail end of the journey is revision. The chaos I am attempting to express usually initially comes out on paper as just that, chaos. It takes a varying number of revisions from poem to poem to arrive at a completed product. However, I simply go through it draft after draft changing words and arrangement to best express my intentions for the poem. Revision is an art in itself. usually when I revise, my audience is myself. I have never attempted to publish any works and therefore am unconcerned with what others think of it. However, it is a possible goal of mine to publish some poetry and when i complete final revisions I take others into consideration, but keeping my thoughts on where the poem is going and how it should read first. Poetry is a journey into the soul of another, therefore, it is most important that what you see is a pure reflection of that person's soul. I believe a poets most important audience, should be themselves.
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